The Race Around the World

Shiva and Parvati had two sons, and they could not have been more different.

Kartikeya was quick and bright, a young warrior with six faces who rode a peacock as fast as light. Ganesha was round and thoughtful, with an elephant's head, a big belly and a mouse for a mount. Both had grown up, and their parents decided it was time for them to marry. But who should marry first?

"We will settle it fairly," said Shiva. "Go around the whole world. Whoever comes back first will be married first."

Kartikeya did not wait for another word. He leapt onto his peacock and was gone, a streak of blue and green across the sky.

Ganesha looked at his mouse. The mouse looked at Ganesha. Around the whole world, on a mouse? Even the mouse did not think so.

So Ganesha went and bathed. He came back, asked his parents to sit together, and then, palms joined, he walked slowly around them, once, twice, seven times. Then he bowed at their feet.

"What is this?" asked Parvati. "You were meant to go around the world."

"I have," said Ganesha. "The scriptures say that to walk around your father and mother is to walk around the whole earth. You are my world. Will you tell me the scriptures are wrong?"

Shiva and Parvati looked at each other and laughed. They could not say the scriptures were wrong, and they could not say their son was wrong either.

So Ganesha won. He was married to two brides, Siddhi and Buddhi, whose names mean success and wisdom. The stories add that in time he had two sons, Kshema and Labha, safety and gain. A god who chooses wisdom over speed ends up with success and prosperity too.

Kartikeya came back from the edge of the world tired and happy, sure that he had won, and found the wedding already over.

He was hurt, and his hurt turned to anger. He felt he had been cheated. Without a word he left Kailash and went south to live alone on Mount Krauncha, and he would not come home.

His parents could not bear it. Shiva and Parvati followed him south. When he still would not return with them, they stayed nearby, so that their son would never be far from them. The hill where they stayed is Srisailam, in Andhra Pradesh, where Shiva is worshipped as Mallikarjuna and Parvati as Bhramaramba, keeping watch over the son who left.

In Tamil Nadu, where Kartikeya is beloved as Murugan, they tell the story with a single fruit.

One day the sage Narada came to Kailash with a gift for Shiva: a golden fruit, the gnana pazham, the fruit of wisdom. Whoever ate it would know everything worth knowing.

Shiva had two sons and one fruit, and a fruit of wisdom is not something you cut in half.

"Here is what we will do," he said. "Whoever goes around the world three times and returns first will have the fruit."

Murugan was on his peacock before his father finished speaking. He flew over oceans and mountains, over forests and deserts, once, twice, three times around the earth.

Ganesha did not move from his place. He thought about it for a while. Then he stood up, walked around his father and mother, and bowed.

"The world is no more than the two of you together," he said. "I have gone around it."

Shiva smiled and placed the fruit of wisdom in his hand.

When Murugan landed, breathless and certain of victory, the fruit had already been eaten.

He said nothing. He took off his jewels, his silk and his crown and laid them down one by one. He shaved his head, wrapped a simple cloth around his waist, took up a plain wooden staff and walked away from Kailash, south, until he came to a hill in the Tamil country. There he stood alone, a young hermit who wanted nothing.

That hill is Palani, and that is how Murugan is worshipped there today, as Dandayudhapani, the one who holds only a staff. Devotees like to say that his parents followed him there and told him gently, "Why do you need a fruit? You are the fruit yourself." Pilgrims climb the hill by the hundreds of thousands, many with shaven heads like his.